The posting
ABOUT AFTERQUERY
AfterQuery https://www.afterquery.com/ is an applied research lab curating data solutions for foundation model development. We serve every frontier AI lab with the mission of delivering the best data to power the best models. In doing so, we can make expertise that once took a lifetime to build available to anyone who needs it.
Our customers are the ones building the foundation models themselves and our work sits directly in the loop of how those systems improve. This is a rare opportunity to join a company at a defining moment in AI. Forbes reported that we could be YC's fastest unicorn, reportedly raising at a $3.2 billion valuation. We're based in San Francisco and backed by leading investors including Altos Ventures, BoxGroup, and Y Combinator and angels from Google DeepMind, OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta Superintelligence Labs, and Microsoft AI.
WHY APPLY
Massive Opportunity: Forbes reported that we could be YC's fastest unicorn, reportedly raising at a $3.2 billion valuation, and we're not slowing down.
Founding Impact: You will own and architect core infrastructure systems that power our platform from the ground up.
Equity & Growth: Competitive salary and meaningful equity. As we scale, you’ll have the opportunity to shape the engineering organization and lead major technical initiatives.
Strong Team: Our founding team has experience from Citadel Securities, Meta, Google, Silver Lake, and Morgan Stanley — work alongside world-class engineers and researchers.
OVERVIEW
We're looking for a Head of Enterprise GTM to own and build AfterQuery's enterprise go-to-market function from the ground up. This person will be responsible for driving enterprise customer acquisition, developing strategic commercial partnerships, structuring complex deals, and ensuring successful delivery of the engagements we sell.
This is a senior, highly autonomous leadership role for someone who can operate as both a strategic leader and a hands-on individual contributor. You will personally identify and pursue high-value enterprise opportunities, build relationships with senior decision-makers, lead complex sales cycles, and translate customer needs into commercially sound engagements that our research and technical teams can execute.
Our core research and technical capabilities are already in place. The primary challenge is bringing those capabilities to the right customers, creating compelling commercial opportunities, and converting them into successful, long-term partnerships. You'll work closely with our researchers and technical leadership to understand what we can deliver, while taking full ownership of how we position, sell, structure, and bring those solutions to market.
You'll own the entire customer lifecycle, from initial prospecting and relationship development through commercial negotiation, engagement launch, delivery, and account expansion. This includes building the operating processes and commercial infrastructure needed to scale the function, as well as establishing and leading a high-performing GTM team as the business grows.
We're looking for someone who can independently drive results from day one, create structure where little exists, and build a repeatable enterprise GTM engine without relying on an existing sales organization or extensive support.
WHAT YOU'LL DO
Own and Build the Enterprise GTM Function
- Take full ownership of AfterQuery's enterprise go-to-market strategy, commercial execution, and overall customer acquisition efforts.
- Define and execute the strategy for identifying, pursuing, and closing high-value enterprise opportunities across AI, technology, and other relevant industries.
- Personally drive outbound prospecting, relationship development, pipeline generation, and strategic account acquisition while building the foundation for a scalable sales organization.
- Establish our enterprise sales motion, including target account strategy, qualification, positioning, pricing, deal structures, and commercial negotiations.
- Identify the highest-value customer use cases for custom evaluations, data generation, model training, and post-training engagements.
- Build the processes, playbooks, metrics, and operating cadence needed to create a repeatable and scalable GTM function.
- Establish, hire, and lead a high-performing enterprise GTM team as the business scales, setting clear expectations for performance, accountability, and execution.
Drive Enterprise Sales and Commercial Strategy
- Build and own relationships with senior executives, business leaders, and technical decision-makers across large enterprise organizations.
- Lead consultative discovery to understand customer workflows, business objectives, technical requirements, and opportunities for AI-driven improvement.
- Translate customer problems into compelling commercial opportunities, developing proposals that connect AfterQuery's capabilities to measurable business outcomes.
- Own the full sales cycle, from initial outreach and discovery through solution scoping, pricing, contracting, and deal closure.
- Structure sophisticated enterprise agreements, balancing customer needs, commercial economics, delivery requirements, and long-term business value.
- Lead complex commercial negotiations, including pricing models, engagement structures, contract terms, and expansion opportunities.
- Develop strategic account relationships that generate repeat business, long-term partnerships, and broader enterprise adoption.
Translate Customer Needs into Executable Engagements
- Partner closely with AfterQuery's research and technical leadership to understand our capabilities and translate them into differentiated enterprise solutions.
- Identify and scope technical engagements involving model evaluations, failure analysis, training data, and post-training approaches such as supervised fine-tuning and reinforcement learning.
- Work with research and technical teams to determine feasibility, resource requirements, timelines, and delivery expectations before committing to customer engagements.
- Translate customer requirements into clearly defined scopes of work, deliverables, success metrics, and commercially viable engagement structures.
- Ensure alignment between what is sold commercially and what can be successfully executed by our research and delivery teams.
- Bring customer feedback, market intelligence, and emerging enterprise needs back to research leadership to inform future capabilities and opportunities.
Own Customer Delivery and Account Expansion
- Maintain ownership of customer engagements beyond the initial contract, ensuring successful execution and delivery against commercial commitments.
- Lead the transition from signed agreement to active engagement, coordinating researchers, technical teams, and operational resources.
- Establish clear accountability for project scope, milestones, deliverables, success criteria, and customer communication.
- Proactively manage delivery risks, resolve escalations, and ensure customer expectations remain aligned with execution.
- Monitor engagement performance and commercial outcomes, identifying opportunities to improve delivery models, engagement economics, and customer satisfaction.
- Turn successful engagements into long-term strategic partnerships, repeat business, case studies, and opportunities for account expansion.
WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR
- 7–10+ years of experience in enterprise sales, strategic business development, commercial leadership, or enterprise GTM at a high-growth technology company.
- A proven track record of independently building enterprise pipelines, acquiring major customers, and closing complex, high-value commercial agreements.
- Experience leading enterprise GTM or sales functions, ideally in an early-stage or high-growth company where you built the commercial motion from the ground up.
- Strong commercial judgment and experience structuring sophisticated enterprise deals, including pricing, contracts, resource requirements, and engagement economics.
- Experience selling complex software, AI solutions, technical services, or research-driven solutions to large enterprise customers.
- Demonstrated ability to operate as a hands-on individual contributor while providing strategic leadership and direction from day one.
- Experience owning customer engagements beyond the sale, including implementation, delivery, stakeholder management, and ensuring contractual commitments are met.
- Strong technical aptitude and the ability to understand complex AI capabilities, engage credibly with technical stakeholders, and translate customer problems into executable solutions.
- Ability to work closely with research, engineering, and operations teams to scope engagements, align resources, and deliver against customer expectations.
- A builder's mindset: you take full ownership, operate independently, move quickly, and create structure where little exists.
- Exceptional executive presence, negotiation, communication, and relationship-building skills.
- Comfort operating in an ambiguous, fast-moving environment where individual ownership, commercial judgment, and results are essential.
PARTICULARLY RELEVANT BACKGROUNDS
We're particularly interested in candidates who have built and scaled enterprise GTM functions within AI, enterprise software, AI infrastructure, or technical services businesses, as well as commercial leaders who have helped large organizations adopt and implement AI at scale.
Relevant experience may include:
- Head of Enterprise Sales, VP of GTM, Chief Commercial Officer, or similar leadership roles at high-growth technology companies.
- Enterprise AI companies selling complex, high-value solutions to frontier AI labs, Fortune 500 companies, or sophisticated enterprise customers.
- AI implementation and transformation leaders at top management consulting firms (MBB) who have led enterprise AI strategy, deployment, and implementation initiatives, working directly with C-suite stakeholders and translating complex business challenges into technical solutions.
- AI infrastructure, technical services, or applied research businesses where commercial leaders own both deal structuring and customer delivery.
- Early-stage companies where the candidate personally generated pipeline, closed strategic accounts, established commercial processes, and built a sales organization.
- Experience managing large enterprise contracts, complex implementations, and long-term strategic customer relationships.
We particularly value candidates who have personally driven revenue, built executive-level relationships, and owned customer outcomes. This could include traditional enterprise sales leaders as well as consulting leaders who have demonstrated the ability to identify commercial opportunities, lead complex AI engagements, and drive successful enterprise implementations.
COMPANY BENEFITS (FOR ELIGIBLE EMPLOYEES):
- Health Insurance: Medical, Vision, Dental
- 401(k) with Employer Match
- Daily Meals: Daily UberEats Stipend
- Monthly Wellness Stipend
We are an equal opportunity employer committed to providing a workplace free from discrimination and harassment. Employment decisions are made without regard to legally protected characteristics under applicable federal, state, or local law.
We comply with applicable pay transparency requirements and provide compensation ranges based on the position, qualifications, experience, and other relevant factors. Reasonable accommodations are available to qualified individuals with disabilities and for sincerely held religious beliefs, as required by law. This job description is intended to describe the general nature and level of work performed and is not an exhaustive list of all duties, responsibilities, qualifications, or working conditions associated with the position. We reserve the right to modify this job description as business needs change.
